Max Von Mayerling

RedRose, on 03 March 2013 - 02:16 AM, said:

RedRose, the programme's cast page dedicates the remaining performances to Sophiya Haque, and the website has carried a statement to the same effect.  The programme still picture Sophiya in the production photographs, which it labels as '2012 cast'.

I really enjoyed the final performance last night.  Beautifully designed and staged, and it really drew me in to the situation and relationships of the soldiers.  Simon Russell Beale was great, but strong performances and direction all round.  Really enjoyed the wit in the lyrics and staging of the songs - good melodies too.

The theatre programme has a variety of articles, yes advertorials really but a range (none on Les Mis now thank goodness!).  Good length article by Peter Nichols extracted from his autobiography, production pics, article on the history of forces entertainment.  Not bad I thought.  £4

I saw the show tonight, and avoided reading your interpretation beforehand 'CraftyMiss' so I could see how it worked for me.  I think I pretty much got what you got - it was the number of Sarahs and Gabriel/Angels that eventually made me think that the busker was using his imagining of all these people's lives as a prism for his own relationship and what went on in it.  It might be helpful if the Busker was more active (on occasions) during the scenes he's imagining - perhaps changing a detail, word, or colour in the scene as he improves on his first thought.  I know at an early point he poses the people in the lift, but the sense that they're his creations to invent and manipulate dissipates quickly, and I can't claim to have 'got it' from that early moment.  Also, i think the Busker loses his sense of being the creator/inventor early on because the others all join in with the '54 seconds in a lift' refrain; it makes them seem like equal storytellers in an ensemble show of vignettes.  It's fine when they're all singing their own pre-occupations simultaneously in that same number, as they're individuals unaware of each other and not 'banding together' to 'make a show'.  The busker makes the show.

I didn't realise my 'prejudice' about American accented singing would be relevant to this question about clarity, but here goes....  Okay, it's a musical; but I doubt that the busker imagines the lift passengers singing when he invents their stories - but speaking.  In which case it would really help the clarity of them being his invention if they sang as they spoke (and with less enunciated MT style, or aiming for the 'beautifull' note and vibrato - would that be the busker's taste?).  I really liked the cast, but I'd love to see it again with the same cast doing it....differently.  When Cynthia Erivo sang the word Photograph and rhymed it with 'laugh' rather than the 'naff' I wanted to cheer - and I really believed her for singing as she spoke.

Anyway, congratulations to writers and cast on the stage the show has reached, and the box office success - it's a huge achievement in a rough rotten industry ha ha..  There are wrinkles to be ironed out, but I don't think it would take a lot to get more clarity.

Sounds perfect for Soho.......well, SoHo, New York.  It's an 'Off-Broadway' sound telling a London story?  I must try to keep an open mind though and go and see it.....

Steffi, on 25 January 2013 - 12:18 PM, said:

Be sure to let us know what you think of it!

MrBarnaby, on 20 January 2013 - 08:31 PM, said:

I agree, how about the Old VIc Tunnels.  Wouldn't it have been great at the Southwark Playhouse in their sadly now departed London Bridge days?  Those scenes on the edge of the train tunnel would have been amazing.